


we try to make some sense of this

by majesdane



Category: Runaways (Comics)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-12-31
Updated: 2008-12-31
Packaged: 2017-12-06 09:14:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 768
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/734016
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/majesdane/pseuds/majesdane
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>She wants to go back to when Nico would smile at her and there wasn't anything to think about except the fact that it had happened.</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	we try to make some sense of this

 

something continues and i don't know what to call it  
though the language is full of suggestions  
\-- 'a birthday,' w.s. merwin

 

 

Xavin catches Nico's eye as she turns to leave, to go out and try to comfort Karolina. Something passes between them, something that Nico can't quite define. She quickly turns her head away, pushes open the back door to the house and steps outside without a word.

She can see Karolina standing at the edge of the waves, the water splashing over and up and around her feet. The setting sun looks like the water is on fire, but it gives Karolina this glow, like sometimes at night when she's running low on solar power.

When Nico puts her arm around Karolina, fingers sliding along the warm skin of her shoulder, and says, _We love you, y'know_ , she's means the team, the group, Victor and Molly and Chase and the others. But she is also thinking about herself and Xavin, and she can see them in her mind, herself and Karolina and Xavin and Karolina, connected together -- _the red string of fate_ , she almost wants to say, but she won't allow herself to be quite that cliche -- and she thinks maybe they're the 'we' that rolls off her tongue, that maybe they're the ones who she really means to be referring to.

And she wonders what Karolina thinks about what she's just said, if Karolina's even thinking about it all, as Karolina sighs and rests her head against Nico's shoulder.

 

;;

 

She wants to say something, anything, because this silence is almost too much for her to bear. But she can't. The right words just won't come to her, and what _can_ she say right now, because she knows what vaDanti said, and it's all together different from what she -- and the others too, they must have -- heard, and maybe if she could just stop internalizing everything for a second she could think of what to say.

Nico's fingers grip her shoulder tightly, keep her close.

Karolina watches the light from the setting sun reflecting off the water, and she wonders if the two of them could just run away from all of this. The thought is ridiculous, insane, to be running away from running away. And there's Molly to think about, and Klara, and Chase and Victor. And Xavin. Maybe, she thinks, amending her thoughts, she and Xavin could escape this. She wants to go back to when things were easy, when she woke up every morning with Xavin kissing her, when they sat in bed and looked out the windows at the unending expanse of space and the tiny flickering stars all around them.

And she wants to go back to when Nico would smile at her and there wasn't anything to think about except the fact that it had happened. Back when she didn't have to worry about loving two people -- it's so simple for her, so easy to separate her heart into pieces for them. But she can't _say_ that, can't say she loves them both and in ways so unalike she can't even begin to count the differences.

Xavin is home. Nico is constant.

She wishes that she could love them both and spare them all thoughts of broken hearts.

 

;;

 

Xavin doesn't need to have Karolina say anything to know that things aren't right.

It's not really so much that they're not right, it's just that things have changed. She can feel it in the heart of her, an uneasy sort of feeling, the kind that settles in the pit of her stomach, heavily, and makes her think that she's going to be sick. There should be no reason for her to feel like this, she thinks. They haven't -- _she_ hasn't -- done anything wrong. They should be fine, they shouldn't be standing side by side, barely even able to look at each other. There shouldn't be this awkward silence between them, and Xavin shouldn't feel like the world they've built for themselves is slowly falling apart.

But there is, and she does, and she doesn't know what to do.

There is a part of her that wonders what Nico would have to say about all of this. She pushes that part down, down, deep inside of her, to hide it away, to pretend that part of her doesn't exist. She refuses to let herself be jealous of Nico, of a romance that doesn't even exist. It's stupid and petty and it isn't even the issue at hand here.

Yet, when she says, _Are we okay?_ , she wonders exactly who the 'we' is.


End file.
